Two pharmaceutical multinationals are partnering with the Quebec government on what they’re calling a new approach to drug development as a public-private partnership. AstraZeneca Plc and Pfizer Inc. said Friday they would team with Quebec to create the Neomed Institute, a new life sciences research facility in Montreal that will host researchers, university officials and employees from the drug makers as well venture capitalists. The three partners are spending $100-million on the venture, with the largest portion of the financing and the land contributed by AstraZeneca. “The cost of discovering new drugs keeps rising and pharmaceutical companies need to adapt,” the institute’s new president, Max Fehlmann, said in a statement. The research centre is a response to the changing R&D business model in the industry, one in which companies are shifting away from its traditional approach of carrying out research and development activities in-house toward more outsourcing. Neomed aims to bridge the gap between early-stage research and later-stage drug development, the companies said.